Acre finally remembered what had happened.
He hadn't actually seen the lightning—just felt his hair rise and heard the crackle of electricity before everything went black. That would explain the burn marks on his suit and the short-circuiting of his device.
Still, it didn't make sense.
If it really was lightning, he should be dead. His implant should've been completely fried, not merely glitching.
A smarter man would've gone home. Both the lightning and the rat had come out of nowhere—signs that the wasteland was acting up again. He could've gone back, checked with a mechanic, maybe prayed the damage wasn't permanent.
But desperate men couldn't afford to be smart.
Acre decided to stay. For him, the risk was worth it—better than living safely with zero chance of ever climbing out of the mud.
He resumed scavenging in the mounds of waste, pounding away with the same pickaxe he'd used to kill the rat. Excitement fluttered in his chest. Maybe the glitch was only visual—just a flicker on the display, not something deeper.
[You have obtained Metal Scrap x1]
[You have obtained Plastic Bits x1]
[You have obtained Wiring Coils x3]
[You have obtained Depleted Battery Cell x1]
A new scrap appeared in his inventory window. That meant a new slot had opened. But his device was supposed to max out at six.
He froze, then dropped his pickaxe. Before it hit the ground, it vanished.
Acre quickly opened his inventory window.
The first three slots were [Metal Fragments].
The fourth and fifth: [Plastic Shards].
The sixth: [Wire Tangles].
The seventh and eighth: [Scrap Screws and Bolts].
The ninth and tenth: [Infected Rat Skull] and [Infected Rat Fur].
And then, there it was.
An eleventh slot.
Inside it sat the [Battery Cell].
Acre's eyes widened. He took it out, feeling its bloated rectangular pack buzz softly against his greasy palm. Not an illusion. The extra slot was real. The glitch was real.
He grinned—until he noticed something strange.
The inventory still showed the [Battery Cell] inside, even though he was holding it.
Probably lag, he thought. Damaged interfaces sometimes had delayed updates.
He put the cell back.
Now there were two battery cells.
He blinked. That was new.
Curious, he tried again. He pulled out both. Two packs appeared in his hands—yet the same number remained in the slot.
He put them back. The slot now showed four.
Again.
And again.
The number doubled every time.
Acre stared, his heart pounding. A duplication glitch. A duplication glitch.
This shouldn't exist. This was the kind of exploit you only heard about in rumors—something that got people executed.
He felt a cold sweat on his back even as excitement surged through him. He was desperate, yes, but this… this felt wrong.
---
Acre ended his day early. With the duplication glitch, there was no need to waste time swinging a pickaxe.
He made his way to the node center—what other worlds might've called a "city."
Noxis might've been a waste world, but it wasn't uninhabited. Originally used as an exile planet for criminals, its population had grown too large for the Imperium to ignore. Now, it had settlements, infrastructure, and a bureaucratic chokehold pretending to be "governance."
Acre lived in Node 113. Like most frontier zones, its Node Center was a wreck. The concrete walls were cracked, and the "repairs" looked more like scars. The men on the parapet weren't C-Rank regulars, nor even D-Rank auxiliaries, but E-Rank militia—armed with obsolete rifles.
Inside was worse. Rows of dull, rectangular houses packed so tight they made you feel suffocated. The air smelled of rust, sweat, and human waste. Blank faces passed each other in silence.
Only the main square looked remotely livable—where the elites and traders gathered, pretending Node 113 wasn't a dump.
Acre headed for a narrow alley and stopped before a small, tidy building: the Scrap-Assembler's Guild. The place looked out of place among its crumbling neighbors. Fitting—Assemblers were barely above scavengers, but still a step higher.
He stepped inside.
The first floor was empty, as expected. Most trades happened through spatial inventories, so there wasn't much to see. A cleaning bot whirred nearby, muttering a robotic greeting.
"Hello, sweeper," Acre greeted back.
"Ah, Acre. You're early."
The voice came from the man behind the desk—Olech, a childhood friend.
"You won't believe what happened to me," Acre said with a wide grin.
Olech raised a brow and turned off the screen he'd been watching. "Must be something good."
"Yes… very good." Acre stopped himself before blurting out the truth about the glitch. Too dangerous. Too unbelievable. "I, uh… found a mound of depleted battery packs!"
Olech's eyes widened. "You serious? That's scrap lithium! How many?"
Acre checked his inventory. He had twenty slots filled with duplicated battery packs—created in under ten minutes. But he couldn't sell them all. No scavenger could have that much at once.
"Six slots' worth," he said. "And there's more where that came from."
Olech beamed. "A full haul! You're finally catching a break. I told you, Acre, you worry too much."
Acre smiled faintly. Without the glitch, he knew how absurd this story sounded. Finding that much lithium was like winning the lottery—something that happened once in a lifetime or never at all.
Olech reached under the desk and pulled out a trade tablet, tapping in the data before handing it over.
Acre read the display:
[Node 113 – Official Scrap-Assembler Guild Trade Offer]
Offered: 360 Credits
Requested: Depleted Battery Cell x360]
[Accept Trade Offer?]
His grin widened. He tapped Yes.
[Trade Successful]
[Depleted Battery Cell x360 removed from Inventory]
[360 Credits On Hold]
[-36 Credits (10% Guild Cut)]
[-36 Credits (10% Zone Security Fee)]
[-54 Credits (15% Recycling Tariff)]
[-18 Credits (5% Service Surcharge)]
[You have received 216 Credits]
Acre's grin slowly faded.
Ah, yes. Taxes. The true monster of the Imperium.
He pocketed his tablet and chuckled bitterly.
Why should he feel guilty about exploiting a glitch?
The Imperium had been cheating him first.